Decker-Petty’s stunning outing, offense’s home run party leads to an 18-6 win and series sweep over Rutgers
By Zach Horwitz @HorwitzZach April 28th, 2024
“If you throw a team into the deep end, sometimes they sink and sometimes they swim.” Jeff Mercer stresses the importance of playing a tough non-conference schedule early in the season. The upshot seems to be paying off.
Indiana Hoosiers 18, Rutgers Scarlet Knights 6:
Inning by inning details in the Live Game Blog | Box Score
Indiana has played its best baseball as of late. For the second straight outing, they tacked on double-digit hits and runs. The whole scene is coming to fruition.
While it’s easy to apply the offensive production to the win total, the pitching side is most relevant to the jumpstart in Big Ten play. On a weekend that Indiana was without Connor Foley, they utilized just seven arms to earn a series sweep over Rutgers. On the Friday opener, it was the combination of Julian Tonghini and Brayden Risedorph, “making the statement that we’re going to go for it [this weekend].” Mercer got significant outings from once lower-leverage hurlers in Drew Buhr on Saturday and Aydan Decker-Petty on Sunday.
Decker-Petty entered Sunday’s matinee with a large task at hand, needing to get Indiana out of a hole in which Ty Rybarczyk tossed just 2.1 innings. The 6’5 sophomore dug deep, holding on to IU’s 9-5 advantage when he entered. “ADP was the star of the day,” Mercer stated postgame. “Every pitch was his best, 93-96 mph with some outstanding changeups in there. The ability to go through just seven guys and get some length out of the pen, that just changes the course of the weekend and the season.”
Decker-Petty was efficient, tacking on 38 of his 60 pitches for strikes in his 4.2 frames. But, none of his success is due without credit to his dugout. The Indiana lineup mashed five home runs today and stayed patient at the plate, taking advantage of the depleted Rutgers bullpen. The Scarlet Knights used six pitchers to get through the seven innings played.
The Hoosiers took 11 free passes, with seven of those being walks. When pitches were left over the plate, they hammered them. Carter Mathison led the party with a 451-foot bomb to centerfield to get out to a 2-1 lead. Also in the second inning, Tyler Cerny gave Indiana a commanding advantage with his grand slam that measured 102 mph off the bat.
Devin Taylor felt back at home in the leadoff spot of the order this past weekend. Taylor mentioned “I had to lead off a couple days back in high school… there’s still no difference” when speaking about his approach. The Cincinnati native crushed his third homer of the series, a towering 433-foot shot in the fifth inning. “Devin gets pitched differently and we’ve talked about that all year,” Mercer said. “He’s so prepared in these moments but the big thing is his ability to leave the inside pitch alone.” Taylor got a changeup over the outer half of the plate and deposited it over the wall to give Indiana a 10-5 advantage.
IU has found its pieces. A monster weekend for freshman Cal Sefcik who found his name in the lineup card, Carter Mathison got back on track, Devin Taylor sparked a hot streak, and the pitching staff got the job done.
“You got to go play in difficult environments. You got to get your butt kicked… that character it builds and the resiliency, it shows up later in the season.”
Indiana is now winners of four consecutive Big Ten weekend series and sits 7-2-1 in its last ten games. Jeff Mercer’s squad is quietly climbing up the standings, now 10-5 in conference play, and just a game out of first place.
“There’s nothing that college baseball has to throw at us that we haven’t already been through.” The Hoosiers have three weekend series and two midweek matchups to go. They’re rolling at the right time.